No. 13 Yale got here again from a 10-point second-half deficit to upset No. 4 Auburn 78-76 on Friday after Auburn had myriad possibilities to tie or take the lead within the closing 30 seconds.
The Tigers led 61-51 with 9:53 to go earlier than Yale slowly chipped away on the lead because of an Auburn scoring drought. The Tigers went over three minutes with out scoring as Yale minimize the result in 4 with 4:41 to go.
Yale then took a 73-72 lead with a 3-pointer by John Poulakidas with 2:11 to go. The groups traded missed pictures earlier than Poulikidas dedicated an off-ball foul on Auburn’s Denver Jones with 46 seconds to go.
From there, the Bulldogs held on. By some means.
Jones, an 88% free throw shooter, missed the primary finish of a 1-and-1 earlier than Danny Wolf made two extra free throws to increase the result in three. Auburn had an opportunity to tie the sport with lower than 30 seconds to go, however Tre Donaldson’s 3-pointer clanked off the rim.
Then after Yassine Gharram made considered one of two free throws, Auburn’s Ok.D. Johnson obtained fouled as he made a layup with 9.4 seconds to left.
Johnson missed his free throw, however Auburn obtained the ball through the possession arrow after a tie-up on the rebound.
Tre Donaldson then obtained fouled below the basket on the inbounds move and went to the free-throw line. He missed each of his free throws … and Auburn obtained the rebound. Johni Broome missed a game-tying putback as he crashed laborious to the ground and Jaylin Williams had a shot blocked earlier than time expired.
Broome appeared to undergo a proper knee damage as he fell to the ground and was seated on the court docket as Yale celebrated its victory.
Poulakidas had a game-high 28 factors. He was 10-of-15 from the sphere and 6-of-9 from the 3-point line. Broome had 24 factors as he was 7-10 from the sphere and 9-of-11 from the road.
The victory is the primary within the NCAA event for Yale because the Bulldogs upset No. 5 Baylor as a No. 12 seed in 2016. The Bulldogs had made two March Insanity appearances since then and misplaced each of their first-round video games as a No. 14 seed.
Auburn’s loss continued a horrible begin to the NCAA event for the SEC. The Tigers grew to become the fifth SEC crew to lose within the first spherical as they fell simply minutes after Florida misplaced to Colorado. Mississippi State, Kentucky and South Carolina all misplaced on Thursday. Tennessee was the one SEC faculty to publish a victory on the primary day of the event.
The Tigers entered the NCAA event because the SEC event champions and had been the No. 7 favourite at BetMGM to win the nationwide title. You may make a convincing case that Auburn was underseeded on the No. 4 line forward of the event. However Auburn didn’t play like a favourite on Friday.
Auburn had quite a few possibilities to place Yale away over the course of the second half and simply merely couldn’t do it. The Tigers additionally missed Chad Baker-Mazara. He was ejected throughout the first 5 minutes of the sport for a flagrant 2 foul on Yale’s August Mahoney. Baker-Mazara entered the sport as Auburn’s third-leading scorer.